Miss Merrill had told him something about herself before he had left. It appeared that she was the daughter of a doctor in Gloucester who had died some years previously. Her mother had died while she was a small child, and she was now alone in the world save for a sister who was married and living in Edinburgh. Her father had left her enough to live on fairly comfortably, but by cutting down her expenditure on board and lodging to the minimum she had been able to find the wherewithal necessary to enable her to take up seriously her hobby of painting. She was getting on well with that. She had not yet sold any pictures, but her art masters and the dealers to whom she had shown her work were encouraging. She also made a study of architectural details—moldings, string courses, capitals, etc.—which, having photographed them with her half-plate camera and flashlight apparatus, she worked into decorative panels and head and tail pieces for magazine illustration and poster work. With these also she was having fair success.
Cheyne was enthused by the idea of this girl starting out thus boldly to carve, singlehanded, her career in the world, and he spent as much time that evening thinking of her pluck and of her chances of success as of the mysterious affair in which now they were both engaged.
His first visit next day was to a man called Hake, whom he had met during the war and who was now a clerk in one of the departments of the Admiralty. From him he received definite confirmation that the whole of the Hull barony story was a fabrication of James Dangle’s nimble brain. No such diplomat as St. John Price had ever existed, though it was true that Arnold Price had at the time in question been third officer of the Maurania. Hake added a further interesting fact, though whether it was connected with Cheyne’s affair there was nothing to indicate. Price, the real Arnold Price through whom the whole mystery had arisen, had recently disappeared. He had left his ship at Bombay on a few days’ leave and had not returned. At least he had not returned up to the latest date of which Hake had heard. Cheyne begged his friend to let him know immediately if anything was learned as to Price’s fate, which the other promised to do.
In the afternoon Cheyne once more climbed the ten flights of stairs in No. 17 Horne Terrace, but this time he took the ascent slowly enough to avoid having to sit down to recover at the top. Miss Merrill opened to his knock. She was painting and a girl sat on the throne, the original of the picture he had seen the day before. He was told that he might sit down and smoke so long as he kept perfectly quiet and did not interrupt, and for half an hour he lay in the big armchair watching the face on the canvas grow more and more like that of the model. Then a little clock struck four silvery chimes, Miss Merrill threw down her brushes and palette and said “Time!” and the model relaxed her position. Both girls disappeared into the bedroom and emerged presently, the model in outdoor garb and Miss Merrill without her overall. The model let herself out with a “Good-afternoon, Miss Merrill,” while the lady of the house took up the aluminum kettle and began to fill it.
“Gas stove,” she said tersely.
Cheyne produced the expected plop, then stood with his back to the fire, watching his hostess’s preparations for tea. The removal of the overall had revealed a light green knitted jumper of what he believed was artificial silk, with a skirt of a darker shade of the same color. A simple dress, he thought, but tremendously effective. How splendidly it set off the red gold of her hair, and how charmingly it revealed the graceful lines of her slender figure! With her comely, pleasant face and her clear, direct eyes she looked one who would make a good pal.
“Well now, and what’s the program?” she said briskly when tea had been disposed of.
Cheyne began to fill his pipe.
“I scarcely know,” he said slowly. “I’m afraid I’ve not any cut and dried scheme to put up except that I already mentioned: to get into that house somehow and have a look around.”
She moved nervously.